


The Ghost of Persistence.

by MissGrimm



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Bad Jokes, Eventual Healing, F/M, Hospitals, Paramedic - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-11
Updated: 2019-06-11
Packaged: 2020-04-24 15:04:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19175770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissGrimm/pseuds/MissGrimm
Summary: "You heard me.." her words snapping with her brow, careful to not let her anger cause pain tucking him in like a stubborn child.  "You’re in my hospital, under my care. So no. I’m not going to let you freeze" giving one strong last tuck for emphasis."I can't believe you even think that I would?" Still holding the gown to Theons fragile frame, trying to ignore the feeling of his bones.“Do you really think so little of yourself?"Her fingers curling. "…. of me?”----Years past, and using distance to separate herself from a family that has dealt with too much loss.She is now faced to deal with reconnecting with the past, or letting a friend give up the fight for survival.





	The Ghost of Persistence.

**Author's Note:**

> I did post his about a week ago, but took it back down due to a friend offering to proof read it for me. 
> 
> This story Is the main reason my other one has been sitting without an update in a while. I got the idea stuck in my head and got to the point where I really wanted to give it ago. It isn't finished yet, so the ending of this chapter kinda floats a little....
> 
> Pre warning, I do take a while to do updates and I'll be focusing on the next chapter for my other one before I come back to this. 
> 
> I originally wanted to posted it in full when I had finished it. But its going to take me some time, and I'm interested in any possible feedback. I want to get better at writing so constructive criticism is the best way to go.
> 
> So see what you think, and happy readings.

At ten o'clock on Friday night, home is where she should have been. With her work boots off, resting by the fire with a cup of tea in hand. A night in, well earnt after a hard week.  
But instead of Lady at her feet, her thick warm coat cuddling up against her toes, sharing the noise of her cheesy soaps. She was still at work.

Not for money, nor lack of staff. But her own personal time, now spent watching a heart monitor. That little green line of hope, rising every second her friend was fighting. 

One beep, then another. A noise she had learnt to put in the back of her mind, now stood at the forefront of everything. Every rise and fall of that little line watched by tired and desperate eyes.

She had done everything in her power to save him, to get him here alive. Through busy streets, and sirens blaring, every second in the back of the ambulance feeling stretched. Her whole world muting around her, as her shaky hands tried to maintain his vitals.

That when the calm had finally caught up with her, and she was forced to the sidelines, unable to do anything more than watch him sleeping in the world of white, and pale green walls. All she could do was grip his limp hand, and try not to think about how he got there. How he had fallen so far into the hell she had found him in.

No one had known he was there. Out of the five paramedics on site. She’d had been the one to find the basement door, hidden and unsearched, locking her friend away from the help above. 

It had been the last shift of the night, a six-thirty call out to Flea Bottom. Dinner abandoned, coffee left to go cold, all for a discovered drug bust. Larger than originally predicted, now requiring medical assistance from surrounding hospitals. 

It hadn't been her first, nor was it going to be her last. It was just the life she had signed up to. Saving lives, no matter their occupation or interests. Yet, it still didn't take away the disappointment of having to leave half a curry behind, knowing it just wasn't going to taste the same reheated.

But having another meal abandoned became the least of her concerns of the night, one that should've been closing to an end. 

Her second was Jenye’s lead foot claiming a new record. Both hands on the wheel, determination burning in those brown eyes. She proudly made it through streets filled with late workers, and people on the hunt for food, in under fifteen minutes.

Her driving was always as erratic as the untamable bun of brown hair upon her head. The sporadic strands always fighting the hair tie instead of conforming to the hold.

But that was Jeyne, and will always be Jenye for as long as she had known her; three years of living life as it comes. Never slowing, even if that meant ignoring the white knuckles of her passenger from taking the last corner that bit too sharp. 

She just couldn’t help herself “Smashed it” Celebrating with a shoulder nudge as they made their way from their chariot of health care. To the house with tragedy behind its walls.

“Minus nearly hitting the old women?” giving her a warning in the returned smile.

“Minus… nearly hitting the old women…”

“It's like you think we don’t have enough work already?”

But Jenye, never one to stress, laughed it off as she always did. "Got to pay the mortgage somehow?” Giving a cheeky smile, a welcome contrast to the grim situation they were headed to.

The location had been smaller than she had expected; A basic council house of brick and stone, identical to the other four up the road and the six going down. Shoulder to shoulder. Mirroring the opposite side of the street.

Two stories, 4 windows and a chimney. Nothing grand. But a home like many to the residence of Flea Bottom. Affordable, but not known to be warm. Cheap homes, for a growing population.

Considering how often they were called to Flea bottom, the locals just couldn’t help themselves. The hordes of nosy neighbours and rubberneckers making their appearance before them and the other paramedics had even gotten there. 

They were a constant hindrance in her job, and with the night wearing on her brow, she used shoulders and elbows "Excuse me…. Move." to get past the wall of observers oblivious to the fact that she had her First Aid plastered on the breast and the back of her navy blue uniform. Too busy watching the only building with torches roaming in the growing darkness. The moon failing its chase for the sun, Another cold night, pulling the steam from her breath.

From the crowd outside and in past the broken door. The inside painted a picture she had seen too many times for it to grasp at emotional response anymore. Wallpaper torn and faded, a house condemned due to neglect. Plumbing, electric all ignored for a higher priority needing a ceiling and four walls. A shelter to sell a habit. 

It was nothing like her first drug bust, a shoot out years ago that had stained the walls and carpet. Ending in silent tears, and a cold shower that had lasted all night. No, this time the blood just felt routine in the world of sunken faces and stale smells of men and women lured in by the devil's temptation. A problem that was wasting resources to save the broken.

Searching through the remaining victims to offer aid where she could. It had been a lone woman in the kitchen that had to lead her to the basement. To a friend, she had once presumed Dead. Gone so long from her life, she hadn’t thought of his name in months. Closer to years.

The women had been sitting on the tiles that were embedded with years worth of grime. Hiding in the corner where the cabinets met. The women, possibly twenty, with hair that should have been silk, now hay, wild as her eyes, turned down medical attention. 

Keeping her words to herself, locking away her few remaining teeth. She pointed with a witches finger, Spindly and bone, shaking at door at the end of the kitchen.

She couldn't see it at first. Mistaking the women attention for the fridge in front. Unaware there was a door hiding behind it. It wasn't till further inspection did she see the latch, secured with a padlock. Stopping the fridge from being flush from the door.

She could still remember the chill, the cold of the night kissing her skin, as two officers pushed the fridge aside. Its feet scraping a path already embedded into the floor.

The rusted steel door, was true omen if she'd ever seen one. Its face too dull to reflect the moon, cold enough to create its own mist.   
What every was behind that, felt locked away for a reason. A secret that wasn't supposed to be found.

Her slender fingers found their way to her necklace at the drop of its lock. Her eyes were drawn in by the darkness revealed by the wailing door. A cry of years passed in its hinges. 

In usual circumstances, she would have held back, let the officers search and wait for a call for medical if she was needed. 

But this time... there was something different. A silent call to follow the torchlight in the darkness. Past the omens warning. 

She couldn't stop herself. Maybe it was looking for that rush the job used to give her or the monotony of her lonely household pushing her to search the unknown? But with a delicate hand breaching the doorway, She took a cautious step down.

With only the glow of torchlight, she struggled to make out much. Cement walls, reflecting the same cement on the ground. Separated by filth, rubbish, rotting away in the leak dripping in the distance.

The smell that occupied it was far from pleasant. A scent she recognized as the neglect of basic human rights mixed with rot. It was nauseating curling her nose hair, staining the back of her tongue with bile.   
Hand to mouth she had to stop her half-eaten dinner from coming back up for a second round.

There had been a split second of hesitation, a thought she was going to carry around with her for the rest of her life.

What would've happened if she had turned around and left? Too deterred by the stench, that it had been someone else that had found him, a body that might have been missed till the morning light. Too far gone to survive. 

It happened when the smell had gotten too much, and she was already starting to back up the stairs, watching as the officers gave a quick scan, finding nothing but rubbish

At first, she paid little attention. A small rustle in the distance, thinking of the mice that were infesting the ground below the stairs, but it wasn't until she turned to look back to that steel door, and the thought of the women came back creeping in

She just couldn't let it go. There was something or someone down here... there had to be?

Taking one last look downwards she heard it again. This time louder, a skeleton's sleep being disturbed, it’s groan crawling through the quiet air.

Scanning with careful eyes, taking a higher step. Her torch landed on a lone mattress in the far corner. Tattered and far from its original white. Squished in behind barrels and cardboard. Pale legs reflecting in the shine of her light.

Her years of training moved her before her brain had a chance to engage. Avoiding the first puddle of murky water. Torch gripped tight, she left no time to think. Only act.   
This man needed medical attention, it didn't matter if he had been put here, or this had been his own doing. He needed help.

Her pace was strong but froze in an instant when she saw the whole picture. The sight would have twisted an iron stomach. An emancipated male, age unreadable. Huddled into himself. His spine pulling the skin of his back as he fought for warmth.

It was hard to thing to see how far a man could fall without accepting deaths kiss. His shallow skin layered with lesions and the filth he was lying in. Looking more corpse than man.

She was frozen, only finding the strength to move when she heard him echo his discomfort again. A cry for help she couldn't ignore.

With her chest pumping loud, she ordered the officers to find Jeyne and organize a stretcher.

"Get her now" Her knees bracing the cold puddle, now seeping into her pants.

The snapping of the gloves was the last thing she could remember clearly. With a gentle touch, she had checked his breath, found his pulse. Then following normal procedure she made it up to the face, his eyes. 

"Sir, can you hear me? My name is Sansa Stark. I'm from King's Central Hospital." Grabbing his chin to bring it closer "I'm here to help. Can you hear.."

It didn't matter how little fat his face had, or the scabs that littered the skin. She knew those eyes even when they were unresponsive to light. The curve of the jawline, and lips that use to smile wider than anyone else.  
Pushing the strands of hair, moving his fringe, she saw him in whole. Past the sunken eyes, it was a face that had been considered family all through her childhood. Her brother's best friend.

"Theon?"

How and why? Was all she could think over and over as she held his head still, trying to remember the last time she had seen him, heard from him?

It had been years .. not since her brother's funeral. A six-year-old wound that still hadn't healed. Her brother's smile fading into the darkness leaving a lingering silhouette in the falling rain. 

Back in the hospital bed far from the basement, gripping his hand tight. She cursed herself for the little effort she had put towards contacting him. For using distance, another city to push away from everyone, an excuse to fall out of contact. Never expecting to see him again. 

Especially in this state like this. The fluorescent lights paying him no favour. Every rib casting a shadow above a shrunken stomach that was going to take weeks to fix. 

It was a hard thing to see, knowing in his youth his pride had always been in his looks, most of his money earnt spent on clothes or dry cleaning. Never trusting her mother with an iron, something today would still make her smile. Remembering the way he would watch with an eagle's eye whenever she offered to do his laundry, then still paying for it to be pressed properly.  
Vanity he won't be able to touch again...

They were far from those days now, her teens years further from her impending thirties, and Theon’s good looks were past the point of recovery.

The grim had gotten into his scabs, his grazes and cuts, hundreds of them, all painfully revealing themselves, when she had cleaned his skin. Water that never seemed to come back clear, no matter how many times she changed it.

But she had been too late, the infection that had already started to spread through his wounds. A fever he had to fight alongside the rot. His pinky and ring finger, a worrying shade of blue. Time only telling if they will survive the coming days.

The more she studied him, the harder it was to conceive how he got into this state. 

Theon, he had always been rebellious, from the wrong side of the tracks, but harmless.   
His leather was never to intimidate, but was to show his feathers, a peacock flaring for the women. Aiding him in the hunt for new name each week to house under his arm.

He was the biggest flirt around who only ever had time for one friend in his life. A bright-eyed bushy tail, oldest of six. Whose heart was always too big for eyes.   
Her brother Robb.

They were a matching pair, a set that was never apart. Earning himself a permanent plate at the family table, which was how often he used to be over. Holiday's, and weekends, rain or shine, he was always there, laughing alongside Robb.

Ten years of constantly seeing that face around her home, she never expected this to be his future... 

\------

By the time it crawled passed midnight, he still hadn’t stirred. She found herself staring at the blank screen on her phone. Past the tired green eyes, and her chestnut bun, usually bound tight, looking more like Jeyne's. A frazzled mess.

She was stuck, trying to hunt for the right thing to do. For the right person to call.

Names passed through her mind, a sister she hadn’t messaged in months, brothers that had become names on her Christmas card list. They all knew Theon as she did, but was it worth going through the rigmarole of false apologizes and promises that she knew she wouldn’t keep. 

They were distant faces she wanted to keep at arm's length. Their voice's too harsh a reminder of the past.

It had taken her a long time to peel herself apart, and the idea of rebuilding bridges she didn't want to cross. What if he didn’t wake up? 

Then it would all be for waste, and it would just end in another funeral for them to share. 

Jenye’s hand appearing on her shoulder was a welcomed break, her grip tightening, trying to relieve the pressure that had been building in her shoulders. “Still not awake yet?”

“No” her voice coming out softer than she anticipated, a worry that was lying deep. 

“My guess, he’ll be out all night” Replacing the phone in her hand with a warm cup of tea, the heat emanating through the polystyrene, waking her fingertips. “Maybe call it, love. You're not on tomorrow. Get some sleep?” Giving one last squeeze “The lords know you need it”

“Yeah,” Pulling the cup in close “I will soon.”

\-----

But of course, she didn’t. Instead, she spent the two nights she had off, curled up, stiffening her joints, waiting for those blue eyes to stir. Even when the wheels of trolleys, the shouts of alarms, and nurse chatter constantly pulled her away from her sleep, she still stayed.

She was lucky to have the lovely women from next door to look after her girl Lady. It didn’t take much convincing, the women was already halfway trying to adopt Lady from underneath her. Treats always showing up on the back door. Sleepovers when she worked late nights. Shared custody, that worked for both of them.

Add in managing to convince her supervisor, to do double shifts, and the weekend stretched to the week.

Through two separate surgeries; those fingers now were gone and a haunting night when the line stopped still, she sat there through all of them. Sleeping on hard chairs, stomaching hospital food. Watching, waiting. For reasons, she wasn’t sure about.

Originally she thought it had been the initial shock, a need for answers. A why? But then nostalgia started to creep in. Hidden in the memories carved into his face.

A summer down at the lake house, spending nearly every day out in the water with sun-kissed skin and smiles, laughter that would carry in the endless blue sky.

One of the last times the family was together, whole. When her parents had been around, and Rickon and Robb were still breathing life into the world. All of them there, her clan of nine, including Theon.   
Rickon and Bran her two youngest brothers. One as wild as the brown locks upon his head, the other inquisitive as Einstein. Two opposites that could never seem to get along. Chasing each other hollering and squealing about their new water guns. 

The sun glistening through the water droplet, the heat bathing her skin. A summer she had never wanted to end.  
Even her mother had found time to relax. A busy woman, bathing in the sun beside her, letting their father do the footwork for a change. Chasing Arya, her sister, younger than her by 3 years, wild eyes, and a button nose who had stolen his beer, teasing him with it. Till Jon picked her high above his shoulder; seventeen, a year below Robb, and carried her into the water. Her kicking and fighting feeding into his smile. A perfect family, living the perfect home video. 

Then there had been Theon, a year older than all of her siblings. Standing beside her chair lighting his smoke. His broad shoulders back then muscled and toned, creating a shadow for her sun.

“You make a better door than a window.” Dipping her sunglasses, naive as any sixteen years old was. Happy believing that her good skin and bone structure would be all she needed to get anywhere in life. Not knowing the harsh lesson that was still waiting in the wings. To never let yourself be someone’s trophy.

Especially to shirtless boys who had a committed relationship to swimming and the gym. “I never block the sun doll, it lives to make me shine.” Smoke pressed between his smirk, a Theon Greyjoy feature her mother never approved of.

“Greyjoy...” Her mother’s voice giving a stern warning that grew his smirk. 

“No harm no foul” he shrugged, the little devil playing in his eyes “But I’m pretty sure the princess has had enough sun for the day. Don’t you?”

She could still remember her drink spilling into the grass, her sunglasses falling to the ground, as his arms fought to get her over his shoulder. "Theon, don't you dare!" Her light frame meaning nothing to his athlete's body. Her squeals and fists thudding against his muscles. While his laughter drowned her out. "Calm down princess is only a bit of water, she won't kill ya."

She knew she was going into the lake no matter what, this hadn't been her first forceful dip, and her cry for help had only called the attention of Robb. Bright blue eyes, hearty laughter and all, aiding Theon to get her in the lake. Grabbing her ankles to help throw her in. “Come on Sans, time to cool off”

Double trouble. One that always followed the other. A tragedies poem.  
Robb dies, and Theon was now trying to knock on that same door. A lost soul trying to find it’s other half.

Robb's funeral had been hard on everyone, but while drowning in her own grief at the third smile to leave her family. She never once considered the impact it would have on Theon.   
Too self-deluded at the time, her head too far in the clouds to realise that she just hadn’t lost one, but two brothers that day. 

Jeyne coming into the room was originally a welcomed distraction, her caring brown eye's giving her motivation to move from the chair. Stretching out seized joints. Giving her eyes a break to pull away from the face full of memories. Parts of her past she had forgotten she had missed. 

But her arrival came with disheartening news, “Honey, come on. Shifts up.” the call of real-life pulling at her strings again. “I’m sure he’ll still be here when you get back. He’s fought this long right?”

 

\----

 

He was and did remain there for two more weeks, silently shifting, a moaning ghost trying to fight through two more flat lines, and surgery to save his kidney. Filling him with more stitches and tubes. His pale skin somehow losing more colour as he was forced to fight a bigger battle.

But it had been after she had lucked out and got him on her insurance.   
She only managed to slide him in, only due to the fact her parents had been his point of call.  
The Starks, not the Greyjoys, none of his family's number's available to contact even if she wanted to.

It threw her for a curveball at first, not understanding Theon to be that close to her parents. She went searching through her contacts again. Looking past the tired wrinkles in the screen's reflection, creases that were going to wear in, and ask the one person who would have known the answer.

It had been Jon, the number her finger had stopped on. Robb and Jon shared more stories than her, out Friday nights, hungover together on Saturdays. Their friend circles crossing paths more nights than some. 

In the same way, Robb loved it. Jon loathed it.  
Theon presence always being a constant frustration on his brow. 

"Little green there Snowball?" Theon was never able to let the bear rest without giving it one poke. "I did warn you whiskey is a seasoned man's game."

"Not helping... Greyjoy" usually always earning himself a flip of the bird as a reward, satisfaction hiding in that smirk.

Even if Jon only stomached him for Robb's sake, he still knew things she didn't.  
Yet, pausing to look at the insurance papers, she still waited for that energy to appear, the kick she needed to have a conversation she should have made years ago. To make up for the silence.

But she couldn’t, the word just clung to her throat and she put her phone back in her pocket.   
If she couldn’t forgive herself, how could she expect Jon to?

 

\---- 

 

On the night he finally woke up. She had been riding back from a mandatory nurse run, helping older women to get out of the bath, her weak muscle to soft to lift her fragile body up. 

With her forehead pressed up against the cool glass of the ambulance window, her eyes lost focus to passing street lights, trying to tune out the image of what her body will someday come.   
All that wasted time she spent preening herself thinking a prince charming was going to whisk her off her feet. When she could have been spending time with her family. Hours she could have spent sharing secrets with her sister, talking about the world with her father. Out partying with Brothers. So many could bes or missed opportunities wasted staring into the mirror, waiting for her cheekbones to come into season.

“So who is he to you?” Jenye’s voice coming in with the soft ride on the tarsal. A highway back to central. “I know you don’t talk much about your fam.  
but he feels different. There doesn’t seem to many tears.  
If you know what I mean?”

There were a hundred different ways to word who he was to her, but none of them ever seemed to fit. Had he been just Robb’s mate, a forced entry upon her life? or was he the sibling that would keep any secret you told? No matter how shameful it had been.

He always seemed to know when silence was needed. The company on a moonlit night that had ended in tears. His warm shoulders resting against hers as she tried her first smoke on the family's front porch, both of them coming home too late. 

“You’ll see it eventually Sans…. But in the meantime. Just be careful ok.” Letting the smoke, that was never far from his lips drift to the stars above. “Don’t forget. I’ll always answer.” Pulling her in with his arm.

No one ever thought he was a man of his word. His ego to pristinely maintained to care about himself and only himself. But not many people knew the guy behind the smirk to realise that he did care, sometimes a little too much.   
Giving away to the pull of her cheek, seeing her smile in her reflection in the window. She remembers the black eye that had appeared on her ex’s face, and a lie on his lips. Two weeks later she was single, again.

“He’s was a friend” Turning back to Jenye to answer her original question “An old friend I should have called….”

“Did you know?” Giving her a look of concern, an on the nose question. 

“No, no I didn’t” She didn’t think anyone did. He just drank and partied like anyone else his age back then. Maybe getting carried home in between two shoulders more often than not, but it was always accompanied by a laugh and a kiss landing on Robb’s cheek. A common habit of his “She was another good one, Robby boy. ”

"Greyjoy your a mess"

"Yeah, but you can’t call me dull."

Truer words have never left his lips, and somehow through the distance of years, and going through hell and back, he still managed to hold onto his old reputation.

Walking back through the swinging door, imagining a cup of hot coffee finding a way into her hands, a commotion cut her thoughts still. Crashing and banging, the words of angry men bouncing all around. With a shared expression, both her and Jenye rolled their eyes predicting another drunk refusing help. 

She wasn’t interested in helping. They had security for that sole reason, to stop the idiots of the world reaching the educated. There was no point in risking her body, her tools to aid to somebody who didn’t want it. Especially with other nurses on-site, the naive ones who still run towards the fire. 

“Hey, Stark….” Jeyne pulling her away from her thoughts, standing just on the breach of the meeting hallways “You might want to see this?”

Feeling her grip tighten around her clipboard, there was only one outcome those words could mean. Looking to where Jeyne looked, seeing the men run into the room she had been spending her nights, she lost track of her heartbeat, and the world muted again.

It didn’t matter how many years passed, or old memories she had chosen to forget, somehow through the strep and worn outcries she recognized every word as his.

“Theon” Letting a whisper fall from her throat, she let her papers scatter to the floor and ran straight towards the wails of a desperate man. To finally see the friend alive behind those blue eyes. 

Her heart had been too caught up in the past remembering what used to be, she forgot what was, what could be. Leaving her no way prepared for the sight of Theon fighting against restraint. A mouse desperate to get out of the eagle's claws.   
“I didn’t choose this! Let me go. I didn’t choose this. I don’t want this.” Singing words of madness. "Let me go. Let me fucken go! I didn’t want this."

His thin frail frame, nothing against the large hands enclosing around his wrist. Two staunch security guards and one poor little nurse fighting to keep him still as they tried to sedate him. 

Pulling herself back from the door, she clutched her necklace tight and froze like a deer in the headlights.   
Locked in shock she was unable to react to a rabid creature wearing her friend’s face as it bit and hissed, ripping stitches, pulling out the tubes his body needed to live. Sending all care for his health crashing down with him. Falling off the bed with a thud. Silencing the room with a guttural cry 

The noise scared her back afoot, snapping the thin chain around her neck. Whose was this man? 

Taking another step back as he started to crawl towards her. She didn’t see Theon anymore. He was long gone now. Leaving only the junkie she had found in the basement. Fingers wide pulling himself along the floor, the blood draining from his wounds, smearing a trail behind him. “I don’t want this, I don’t want this!” His eyes looking right past who she was. 

“Honey, you don’t want to see this” Was the last thing she heard before a hand gripped tight around her forearm. Dragging her from the sight of the howling creature and back through those swinging doors and into the brisk cold night. 

The chill hit her hard, her gaze finding no safe place to look, as everything just reminded her of his wild eyes, and words full of delirium.

“Shh, just breathe. Just breathe “ Jeyne's hand pulling her away from her lost stare.   
“In and out. In and out, in.. then … out. Come on, you can do this with me.” Brown eyes meeting green, she followed Jeyne’s words. Forcing a change of view. From inside to out. Listening, focusing on her breath.   
“Come on honey, In then out. You’ve got it.” Holding both her hands tight, a stroke of her thumb for grounding. “In.. then … out”

She cursed herself for her first set of tears she let fall in months, a true emotion finally clawing its way through, riding down her left cheek. Theon was mad, downright mad, and she had been a fool.

This wasn’t going to be an easy pass, the connection to a family she was too afraid to admit she missed, too stubborn to contact. She had blinded herself through nostalgia, instead of seeing what has been right in front of her.   
No one who looked like that would ever be sane.

“Thank you” was all she could think to say when the world around her came back into view. The black tar seal of the car lot, reflecting the moon off rain that had been and gone. The smell of wet road fresh in her nose.

“That was wild, huh?” Jeyne’s sneaky smile making an appearance again. Her eye’s always filled with nothing but care.

“Understatement of the year” Pulling her hands back to wipe away the tears that had glistening her cheek. Muffling the sound of her damp breathe she let herself smile to Jenye’s small chuckle.

She had become a woman of very little words, from a teenager who never stopped talking long enough breathe, she now enjoyed silence more than the person beside her. But tonight, she was happy her company knew how to talk, to fill the void with noise. 

“I bet he was a looker” Jeyne pausing to search a purse, her hand grasping something metallic “ You know... Your friend.. before all the scabs, an itch you can't scratch kinda thing. 

You can see it.” Taking a swig of the small flask, that always came out at the end of the shift. “I bet he got all the pootang “Before passing it into her fingers. Still shaking from not knowing what to do, or how to feel.

“Pootang?” unable to hold back the snort, before the burning taste of whiskey hit the back of her tongue. 

“Yeaah, all the ladies” Jenye chuckling to her own humour, thinking nothing was funnier, and even though Sansas never shared it, it was the thing she always adored about Jenye. Always praying the world wouldn’t change her.

 

“Did you?” Even when she would plant herself down beside you, and ask a brash question. 

“Did I what?”

“Go there?”

 

\------

The clattering of keys on her stone top counter echoed the silence of her home. Lady was still next door, and she hadn’t programed her heat pump to warm the place, expecting another night at the hospital.  
So tonight she wasn’t just lonely, she was also cold. A winning combination for a wine aficionado.

Popping a cork of pinot noir she was a glass and a half down before she made it to the shower, and with her phone now gone dead, leaving her no music to play, she was left to the silence of running water, the steam suffocating her in heat. 

Routine was what she needed. Soap, lather rinse, repeat. Again and again, anything to keep her thoughts at bay, scrubbing her skin red raw trying to keep those feeling downs, the ones that always made her weak. Vulnerable. 

But with an accidental heavy elbow, knocking the shower caddy down, the noise startled her to press her naked body to the glass, and she finally felt it.  
The fear from earlier, a flash of Theon’s eyes brought forward the raw thud of her heart, and everything just crumbled.  
Sliding down to her hold her knees, she sat in the river of coloured soaps, and let it all out, every sob, every wail her exhausted body couldn’t handle to hold in anymore. She was tired of the silence and the one person she had been hoping to speak too was further away than she had expected. Unable to even recognize her when she stood a mere three steps from his crawling body.

Catching the sight of the red soap running down the drain, a river of crimson, her thoughts went straight to the blood that had come out of Theon, the sheer neglect for his own body as it smeared on the vinyl. Bringing her hand to her mouth to muffle her cry.   
Did Theon really want to die, just as Robb had. Bleeding out on the side of the road. 

It became too much, the thought of the wrecked car coming flooding back in. It all came up in an instant, the red wine, whiskey the small muffin she had for lunch. All rising from the pit of her stomach. Swirling around the drain, and dripping off her ankles.

Pulling herself in close, tucking her damps knees in tight, she sat there staring, unable to distinguish her tears from the water beads falling from her hair.   
At that moment, she wanted nothing more than to call her mother, to hear her father’s voice just one more time. There warm advice, their love. Just to remember what it had been like to be in there care, to be their daughter. 

 

But she couldn’t they were gone, and nothing was going to bring them back, to bring that feeling back. Not even seeing a face from the past.

 

\----

Starting her day from the bottom of the shower, peeling herself from the cold tiles. She decided it was best for her to stay as she was, to do as had been before... Tightening her bun, letting no-lose strand fall. She was going to get back into the fray of it and keep focused on work.  
Never mind the broken man, who would never smile the way he did when they were kids. 

The memories he carried with him were too heavy, too weighted for her to deal with.   
So following a track record she still held strong she skipped his room as she did breakfasts. Taking the long way around the hospital, to her ambulance if it meant she wouldn’t see that pale skin, the mask of a man she thought she had known. 

Day in day out, a week, then two of the same games. Avoiding any question from nurses who only found entertainment in spreading news, there tongues as loose as their skirts. Constantly sending whispers about her and the madman who kept refusing medical attention. 

But as annoying as mosquitoes on a summer’s day, one slap wouldn’t stop all of them and eventually, she found a lie that stuck. She had felt responsible for him because she had found him, nothing more nothing less. Now he was awake, she had work to get back to. Cold as Sansa Stark was known to be. 

The lie played out well, and she allowed herself to grow numb against the curiosity of his well being, ignoring the whispers through the halls of the madman who refused care. By pushing herself further and further into her work. Until fatigue finally caught up with her, and she collapsed at the end of her shift. A Thursday night rush, after responding to accident an Highgarden produce.

Not enough fluids, not enough food, she knew it was coming the moment the room spun, the cold to hot transition from going outside to in, caught her off guard, stifling her breath, sending her crashing to the hospital floor. 

 

\---

It was an inevitable outcome Even Jenye had seen it coming. Her concerned eyes looking her over in the hospital bed. Handing her a brown bag from the Chinese down the road. Filling her room up with overly fatty rice, and greasy vegetables, a dinner she wouldn’t be able to stomach. But attempted anyway.

She didn’t want to admit it, but she was following her usual path when stress came back into her life, a stomach too twisted to eat, a mind too preoccupied to drink. Dropping a clothes size in two weeks. Not enough fuel going in burning her wick to an end.

This hadn’t been her first time wearing a hospital gown due to stress, but it was the first time at her place of work.  
She had seen the patients view in Watertown District years ago. A breakup, stalking that had turned violent. Scars that will never see the daylight. With no older brother around to protect her anymore. Theon disappearing with Robb, Jon joining the army. She had fallen head over heels for monster after monster. Trapping herself till she was rescued by another one. Never able to see the flags through her rose-tinted glasses. 

Robb did use always tell her to look past what they have, to what they give. Something she never understood until it was too late and the damage had been done. Her trust for men damaged beyond repair.

How cruel was her world, taking away the wise too early. The one who was meant to shine the brightest of all of them. 

Wiping away the third set of tears to break past her wall, she could feel her fingers curling against the thick cotton fabric of her bedsheets. Jenye now long gone, and she was stuck reminiscing again. All because of those damn blue eyes that had forced their way into her life.

Everything had been fine before he had shown up. She had found a system that had worked, a way to get through all her shit. Then he turned up, near dead screaming madness, and she had to start all over again.

Ripping her covers from her legs, the clock flashing 11pm, she grabbed her Iv and trolled it down the hall. Every stern step slapping the vinyl floor as she Strood to that room. His room.  
After all the shit he’s put her through she deserved a damn answer. Why by the seven was he down there?

The closer she powered to the door, the more she could hear an airy sound creeping in, curling around the squeaky wheels of her iv trolley, and into the silent air. It was gentle, smooth a low rumbling tune.

...As soon as I wake up...  
Every night, every day...

..I know that it's you I need  
To take the blues away...

Slowing her pace, she came to a stop two-room down from her original destination. Her ears trying to recognize the tune that was being sung through a well travel road of gravel.

...It must be love, love, love  
It must be love, love, love….

Her eye’s looking to a window, her reflection staring back at her. Past the tired eyes and messy hair, her now slimmer frame. She saw the smile, a small little pinch on her cheek, because, of course out of every song there was in the world Theon was singing that one. 

Nothing more, nothing less  
Love is the best…..

The song Robb would always sing in the shower. 

Feeling her cheek grown warm she wiped the moisture from her nose. He still sounded the same. His voice might be that a bit lower, a little rough around the edges, but it could still hold a tune, the pitch never breaking. 

Halfway through the chorus, she had made her way to the Theon’s room. Watching him with his arm out, an insect spreading its remaining fingers wide studying himself in his solitary.

….As soon as I wake up  
Every night, every day  
I know that it's you I need  
To take the blues away...

But even with the tune in the air and the fact he was awake. She couldn’t pull her eyes away from his spine. Looking like something out of an alien movie. The ridges connecting to the fingers of his ribs still holding tight to the shadows it created. All the muscle he uses to be proud of, now wasted away, nearly unrepairable. Something that would have broken the younger Theon’s heart.

….It must be love, love, love  
It must be love, love, love….

The steps she thought had been gentle enough to not disturb, but as soon as she passed the breach she saw his body tense. Freezing as his words did, pulling his arm back in tight

“Theon?” She whispered. Praying to anyone listening out there. The guardians that were supposed to bring good, to help him to be coherent. To at least recognize her this time.

“Sansa?….They told me you were working here.” His voice still somehow reminding her of butter sliding off toast, gruff running smooth. “Didn’t believe them. Didn’t want to believe them.”

He never turned to look at her, only pushing his spine out further as he drew himself in, keeping his voice to the wall. But that didn’t matter to her, nothing had mattered after he had spoken her name. 

Falling to her impulses, a word on her mind, becoming a voice in her throat. “You remember me?” She let it fall.

The delay in his reply, the silence he left lingering. Her eyes were quick to watch his chest, checking to see if the weak skin was moving. 

Shallow breaths but they were there. So what was the delay?

Eventually, she figured it was due to how many thoughts he must have gone through, landing on the answer that had travelled a journey to get to her “That was the problem. I remember all of you.” His voice nothing but a low growl, an animal that had done fighting. 

With no response to be found for an answer like that. She moved in closer, gliding along the beds metal frame wanting to see those eyes, to see his recognition first hand.

But catching the sight of the strap on his wrist locking him to the bed, her gaze stopped its climb.  
It was tight, too tight, something the nurse should have noticed. The burning ring around the arms of a skeleton. 

Mad or not, that was only going to cause more damage than help. Pushing other priorities aside, she backed off and sourced out the medicine cabinet for a pair of scissors to cut the tie.

Keeping sharp items around someone who was self-destructive, was pretty close to moronic. So with Iv trolly in hand, she headed towards the nurse's office. 

Pushing the pin, waiting for the click of the lock. She was quick on her hunt to find what she needed.  
It wasn't till her hand pass over a replacement strap did she hesitate in her mission.   
In her mind, he was still Theon. Her soft heart failing to look at the gaunt face for what it was. A substance abuser, and a danger to staff.

Grasping the white plastic tight in between her cold fingers. She had to tell her self Theon, friend or not, wasn't above her job. Even if that meant protecting him from himself

He didn't move when she entered. He just sat silent still maintaining his straight stare to the wall in front, avoiding watching her and what she was doing. Even when she had the scissors close to his skin.

He didn't voice his relief when the strap popped, bouncing on the ground below before it fell to a stop. She only got that from the larger breath he took in. His skin finally breaching past his ribs, freeing the trapped shadows.

The replacement strap seemed predicted, but that didn't make it any easier for her. Still laying motionless, he didn't move his arm away from the frame, he just sat there, silently letting the small sound of clicking plastic cut through the air.

In the small interaction of her fingertips brushing past his arm. Locking him in place again. She could tell he was cold, colder than her. Yet he didn't shiver much, only the goosebumps living under his pale skin is the main giveaway. Small but they were there.

Without the energy to ask why, he had no gown, No blankets. Only his bare skin and a pair of briefs. She instinctively started to remove her dressing gown, knowing where to find replacements.  
That’s when those wild eyes finally made their appearance. Blue, and as dark as the shadows below them “Don’t” he snapped. Stopping her hand to shoulder. With nothing but confusion on her brow.

“Theon, your cold” Using the command of the paramedic who cared. She dropped the gown over his shoulders. Her anger still teetering on the edge.

“Take it off” he growled. A Demand that carried little weight. He was no threat to anyone now. Even she outweighed him, something she had never dreamed of seeing. 

“Theon, you’re being ridiculous. Do you want hypothermia?" Speaking a tone that sounded too much like her mother. Stinging herself at the same time. 

But he left her with nothing again, only an irritating silence that implied yes. Confirmed by a weak hand; all his energy lost in the past days. Grabbing the gown and attempting to pull it off. Taking it as far as he could off his stiff body.

Its eventually crumbled to the floor, leaving Sansa standing bewildered. Cross. 

“Just leave it, Sansa.."   
Shifting his head back to its original state. Looking towards those pale green walls again.

The sorry sight of an old friend forcing his expiry date should have left her with tears, a pit forming in her stomach knowing she was losing another one. Her clan shrinking further. But instead of feeling hollow, she burnt hot.

Everything she had cried about now slapping her in the face. Yelling at her to do something, to save him. There was nothing she could have done to stop her brother's demise, her parents' murders.  
But she could damn well stop Theon from leaving.

With a force of energy, she didn't know she had, she clutched the gown tight, ripping from the ground, and spat "No" 

"No?" A small crawl of his old dry humour coming through. A sour laugh salting the wound.

"You heard me.." her words snapping with her brow, careful to not let her anger cause pain tucking him in like a stubborn child. "You’re in my hospital, under my care. So no. I’m not going to let you freeze" giving one strong last tuck for emphasis.  
"I can't believe you even think that I would?" Still holding the gown to Theon's fragile frame, trying to ignore the feeling of his bones.  
“Do you really think so little of yourself?"

Her fingers curling. "…. of me?” 

There was a truth in her words she hadn’t expected. It stung like running tears on dry cheeks.  
Had her self worth fallen that low? Using someone else’s self-destruction as another weapon against herself?

She had been young and stupid, living with head in the clouds, only caring about her own self-worth, she knew this well. By the seven she did... 

She had spent years spent trying to forgive herself, to make it better. To help others when they were in need. But still clutching the soft gown, she couldn't help herself.

"Is that what you really think of me?"

It wasn't an easy pill to swallow, seeing Theon this far from what he used to be, yet he still saw her the same.

“Sansa..” His care sounding too much like Robb as his eyes closed tight. “Don’t… Don’t do that”

"It’s true though Isn’t it." Her hand never leaving his fragile body, raising her head to stop any tears that wanted to escape "Just presuming I would walk away like I wouldn't care.

"Sansa its not.."

"Not what?" Biting too hard, not giving time to let the weak man speak. 

"Not what you think.." His eyes opening to show her his dwindling flame "I’ve just been tired of too long.."

In a moment like this, what could you really say to the eyes that wanted to give up? Anything she thought of only felt like words. Just a loud noise clashing against the silence. So with the release of another tear, she just sat there with him and took his hand. A soft grip for warmth, for grounding, anything to let him rest. Silently falling asleep to the beep of that little green line.


End file.
